![\"\"](\"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/02\/Dr-Xin-Wang-and-PTSD-study.jpg\")
<\/a>Dr. Xin Wang, professor of psychiatry and neuroscience in the UToledo College of Medicine and Life Sciences, led a UToledo research team that spent two years collecting structural MRIs from nearly 1,400 PTSD patients across seven countries.<\/p><\/div>\n
\u201cThis study fundamentally changes what we know about how PTSD physically affects the brain,\u201d said Dr. Xin Wang, professor of psychiatry and neuroscience in the UToledo College of Medicine and Life Sciences. \u201cPatients with PTSD experience not only functional changes in how their brain works, but their brain structure has actually changed as well.<\/p>\n
\u201cMost of the research focus to this point has been on emotion-related areas of the brain. Some small studies have suggested sensory processing regions were also affected, but nobody has had a large data set to confirm those findings and also systematically look at where the structural change happened. This study is doing that.\u201d<\/p>\n
Wang led a UToledo research team that spent two years collecting structural MRIs from nearly 1,400 PTSD patients across seven countries. Using those three-dimensional scans, researchers analyzed 68 regions within the cerebral cortex and compared them to brain scans of nearly 2,200 individuals without PTSD.<\/p>\n
The study \u2014 which relied on the largest mega-analysis to date \u2014 confirmed that PTSD patients experienced atrophy in several areas of the brain that regulate emotional response.<\/p>\n
More critically, however, researchers also observed significant changes in several parts of the cerebral cortex that are responsible for processing sensory information.<\/p>\n
For example, UToledo researchers found structural abnormalities in the lingual gyrus \u2014 a small region near the back of the brain that is involved in visual memory.<\/p>\n
Wang said it\u2019s possible those abnormalities may relate to the vivid flashbacks and nightmares that PTSD patients experience. The study also reported changes in a pair of areas that control the integration of auditory, visual and emotional processing. Structural abnormalities in those areas could play a role in the spontaneous, intrusive memories that can cause negative emotions in people with PTSD and other psychiatric disorders after experiencing trauma.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is an angle that researchers haven\u2019t really looked at before in PTSD and we found it very consistently across our entire sample population,\u201d Wang said. \u201cThis study opens a new field for PTSD researchers.\u201d<\/p>\n
One intriguing implication of Wang\u2019s work could be a shift in how PTSD is treated. Currently, most treatment is focused on emotional regulation and helping patients understand their experiences. With strong evidence that areas of the brain tied to processing sensory input and sensory memory are also affected in PTSD, clinicians may be able to target the condition in new ways.<\/p>\n
\u201cVery few treatments target how patients process sensory information. This evidence from a biological aspect can really help therapists think about additional treatment from new ground,\u201d Wang said. \u201cBetter understanding both the functional and structural changes that underlie PTSD symptoms may provide new targets for both behavioral and pharmaceutical treatments.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Understanding physiological abnormalities present in PTSD patients may create new methods for treating the mental health condition that affects an estimated 8 million Americans annually.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":849,"featured_media":64303,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[38,1,7],"tags":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64299"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/849"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=64299"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64299\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":64301,"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64299\/revisions\/64301"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/64303"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=64299"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=64299"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=64299"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/02\/Dr-Xin-Wang-and-PTSD-study-150x150.jpg\")
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